My 2 cents on the issue for discussion. Basically, there is no way to please everyone, because demand exceeds supply for the good schools, and it’s just human nature to want the best for your child.


But i think there are a few basic principles that we can all agree to:
1. Practical consideration should matter e.g. logistic, distance
2. The system should have some degree of fairness e.g contribution should matter, but those without contribution should not have priority
3. Accept that there will be some degree of uncertainty as demand exceeds supply ultimately and it is left to God’s will / luck as to whether your child can get in

My suggestion is to tweak the system into 4 phases.

Phase 1:
To stay as it is. I think this is probably the one phase that, (maybe not all) but most can agree that it makes sense for siblings to study in the same school for practical reasons.


Phase 2:
All the connected people (alumni, PV, religious association, clan, etc.) to be in this phase. Number of places capped at 50% of remaining vacancies after phase 1. This guarantees that there will be a reasonable amount of places left for the general public (i.e. those without connections).

After reading through so many posts, i think many of these connected stakeholder groups have made and continue to make contribution to the schools and this should be taken into account.

However, I would suggest tweaking it such that:

The school gets to make its own decisions on how many slots it wants to give to each connected group. This is because the school would know best the relative contribution of each group. The school should then work with the various stakeholders so that each group of stakeholder does not recommend too many people into this phase.

1. Alumni or old boys/girls would require a letter from the alumni committee recommending them for this phase. This would put the onus on the alumni network for recommending people who have made contribution to the school. As per my point above, the school should work with the alumni committee to decide on the number they should recommend. For schools with very active contribution from alumni, they should allow more recommendation from the alumni.

This will also mitigate one of the often heard complaints about unfairness whereby an old boy / girl who has not contributed or even connected with the school for more than 10 years should just walks in with a report book and have priority over many others.

2. Religious, clan associations who have contributed much should have more recommendation based on the school decision, but those where the link is weak should not continue having priority based on the school decision.

3. PV - left to the school discretion as to whether they want to continue having PV. e.g. if a school does not have an active contributing alumni, but needs manpower that is contributed through PV, then i would think PV should have higher priority over alumni.

4. Scrap the GRL because i feel their main objective should be to lead and serve the community at large and not the school specifically, so i’m not sure dangling a primary school priority registration carrot necessary leads to the right kind of volunteers.

Another way to give priority to specific stakeholder group is for the school to grant extra ballot slips to groups that have contributed more rather than do it through the recommendation method (which could lead to a lot more paperwork). e.g. if a school thinks the alumni has contributed more, then maybe all alumni should get 2 ballot tickets and a PV will get 1.


Phase 3:
General public - SC and PR.


Phase 4 (if there are still vacancies):
General public - Sc, PR and Foreigners.

Within each phase, i think the current balloting framework should still apply.

These are just some ideas i have, there are probably many implications that have not come to my mind yet.

Does anyone know if this (SC priority over PR) is the end result of the MOE review (speculated to be about connections) mentioned in late Feb, or the review is still ongoing and there will be further announcements? I called MOE but could not get an answer, they just said that this is the latest and they do not have any further updates.


Also, is it possible to get breakdown of SC vs PR / foreigners for past few years application?

thanks in advance.